Trump offers a 'Dreamers' deal for border-money proposal

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump offered a new solution to Democrats that he hopes will lead to a compromise and end of the government shutdown.

In a bid to break the shutdown impasse and fund his long-promised border wall, President Donald Trump on Saturday offered to extend temporary protection for young people brought to the U.S. illegally as children. But while Trump cast the move as a "common-sense compromise," Democrats were quick to dismiss it at a "non-starter."

Trump declared in a statement from the White House that he was "here today to break the logjam and provide Congress with a path forward to end the government shutdown and solve the crisis on the southern border."

Karen Kedrowski, a political science professor at Winthrop University, told Channel 9 that the government shutdown has been going on for an embarrassingly long period of time, and now, there has to be some motivation to get it resolved one way or another.

Sen. Chuck Schumer responded by tweeting that President Trump taking away DACA and TPS protections, then offering them back in exchange for the wall, is not a compromise, but more hostage taking.

Kedrowski said it seems both sides of the aisle hope to end the government shutdown, but some question whether temporary deportation protections in exchange for a permanent wall is enough to reach an agreement.

“It's a starting point,” Kedrowski said. “This has been going on for so long that I think (House Speaker Nancy) Pelosi and Trump are worried about being the one that blinks first.”

North Carolina Republican Sen. Thom Tillis also released a statement in response to the president's announcement, saying, “It is a fair and pragmatic approach to provide funding for border security and offer relief to DACA and TPS recipients -- both goals he says Republicans and Democrats share.

In advance of Trump's remarks, Pelosi said the expected proposal for ending the 29-day partial government shutdown was "a compilation of several previously rejected initiatives, each of which is unacceptable." The California Democrat said Trump's expected offer was "not a good-faith effort" to help the immigrants and could not pass the House.

Seeking to cast the plan as a bipartisan way forward, Trump said he had support from "rank-and-file" Democrats, as top Democrats made clear they had not been consulted. He also said Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell would bring the legislation to a vote this week, though Democrats appeared likely to block it. McConnell had previously stated that no vote should be held in the Senate until Trump and Democrats agreed on a bill.

Trump listed a series of White House immigration funding demands, including $5.7 billion for the wall he argues is needed on humanitarian and security grounds. He said it would not be a concrete structure "from sea to shining sea," but rather "steel barriers in high-priority locations."

To ensure wall funding, Trump said he would extend protections for young people brought to the country illegally as children, known as "Dreamers," as well as for those with temporary protected status after fleeing countries affected by natural disasters or violence.

Administration officials said the protections would apply only to those currently in the Obama-era program shielding them from deportation, and the temporary protected status would apply to those who currently have it and have been in the U.S. since 2011. That means people from El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Haiti - countries that saw the status revoked since Trump took office - would get a reprieve.

Democrats criticized Trump's proposal because it didn't seem to be a permanent solution for those immigrants and because it includes money for the wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, which the party strongly opposes. Democrats also want Trump to reopen government before talks can start.

Trump's overture was greeted initially with skepticism by some Democrats, who were not consulted beforehand, according to a congressional aide who was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.

Democrats made their own move late Friday to break the impasse that has kept the government shut down for a record 29 days when they pledged to provide hundreds of millions of dollars more for border security.

Hundreds of thousands of federal workers have gone without paychecks, with many enduring financial hardship. Many public services are unavailable to Americans during the closure.

Trump did not declare a national emergency, which he has said was an option to circumvent Congress.

"I think it'll be an important statement," Trump told reporters Saturday before traveling to an air base in Delaware to honor four Americans killed in a suicide bomb attack in Syria this week.

Trump previously dismissed a deal involving those young immigrants brought to the U.S. as children, saying he would prefer to see first whether the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program survived a court challenge.

On Friday, the Supreme Court took no action on the Trump administration's request to decide by early summer whether Trump's bid to end that program was legal, meaning it probably will survive at least another year.

But during a trip to the U.S.-Mexico border, Trump hinted at the possibility, saying he would consider working on the wall and DACA "simultaneously."

Lawmakers have pitched similar compromises.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., has spoken about a deal that would include $5 billion in wall funding coupled the Bridge Act and a fix for nearly 400,000 immigrants in the Temporary Protective Status program whose status has been jeopardized by the administration's decision to roll back that program.

A previous attempt to reach a compromise that addressed the status of "Dreamers" broke down a year ago as a result of escalating White House demands.

Democrats are now proposing $563 million to hire 75 more immigration judges, who currently face large backlogs processing cases, and $524 million to improve ports of entry in Calexico, California, and San Luis, Arizona, a Democratic House aide said. The money would be added to spending bills, largely negotiated between the House and Senate, which the House plans to vote on next week.

In addition, Democrats were working toward adding money for more border security personnel and for sensors and other technology to a separate bill financing the Department of Homeland Security, but no funds for a wall or other physical barriers, the aide said.

In a video posted on his Twitter feed late Friday, Trump said both sides should "take the politics out of it" and "get to work" to "make a deal." But he also repeated his warnings, saying: "We have to secure our southern border. If we don't do that, we're a very, very sad and foolish lot."

Few would argue that a humanitarian crisis is unfolding at the U.S.-Mexico border, as the demand for entry by migrants and the Trump administration's hard-line response overwhelm border resources. But critics say Trump has dramatically exaggerated the security risks and they argue that a wall would do little to solve existing problems.

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Associated Press